The pros and cons of knots in wood

Con: There are living knots and dead knots in most types of wood. There are probably living knots and dead knots in all types of wood, as this would make sense to me, but no one has ever told me that. I will go with “most.”

Dead knots fall out, almost always at inopportune times. Right after you’ve applied your third coat of polyurethane. After the project’s already been delivered. These are not ideal times to have a quarter-sized holes in the wood you didn’t anticipate.

When buying lumber for construction, it’s generally best to avoid wood with dead knots. When buying lumber for fine woodworking projects, it’s also best to avoid wood with dead knots … generally.

Pro: Dead knots can create beauty.

You have to know how to deal with the holes these dead knots will create, sooner or later. If a hole is desired, try to tap out the knots before you do anything. If you want to take advantage of the dead knot’s ability to celebrate quality wood stain far greater than knots that are alive, use an adhesive between stain and polyurethane steps to keep it in place — a very small amount, spread in a super thin layer on each side of the knot — is all it takes. Do not do this prior to wood stain, as the adhesive will not absorb stain and that spot will look stupid.

Or you can skip all of this and find another soul who appreciates the beauty of imperfect wood. If you find that person, you’ll never, ever worry about dead knots falling out at inopportune times again.

This post is not about wood working. This is a post about a woman who gives me reason to cherish each moment of my life, including those moments I have building things. She makes me feel like it’s okay to not be perfect.

SHE WANTED A SHELF FOR the 10-by-7 platform I built with pressure treated wood against the back of our house. She immediately began calling it a “patio,” which made me feel like it was more than a platform on concrete slabs I assembled with my nephew one Sunday afternoon.

“Sure,” I said. “What color?”

“I don’t know, you know … something the color of the patio.”

“What color do you want the patio?” I asked, as it will need stained after it’s dried for a few weeks.

“I don’t know.”

“Same color as the swing set and grill platform?” I inquired slyly, trying to get any type of direction available — and looking to use stain I already owned. “We just did those a little while ago … I still have some of that stain left.”

She looked at me excitedly dejected.

“I want the patio to be different — so it stands out.”

Her wish was my command.

THE FOLLOWING SATURDAY morning, I found myself in my wood shop with a six-foot whiteboard resting on the arms of a toddler-sized metal chair, dead knot centered between the two. I pounded it out with a hammer and old screw driver, then slid the board to attack the next.

“Sorry I grabbed a board with knots that are falling out,” I’d said the night before as we held the hardware store item up to where it would serve as a shelf. “It probably works out for the best because I’ll need to drill a few holes in it anyway to let rain through.

“I’ll put some good exterior varnish on it, too, but you still don’t want rain water … ”

She stopped my explanation.

“I like the holes where the knots fell out,” she said. “It makes it look like real wood.”

It obviously was real wood. That’s not what she meant.

Wood with imperfections, perhaps? No, as that implies wood isn’t perfect unless it’s been processed by a lumber mill. Maybe it’s the wood with dead knots that’s perfect to her.

I decided the answer to this as I was finishing shaping, sanding and varnishing this $6 board that will bring multiple smiles to her life:

It’s that it isn’t perfect to others that makes it perfect to her. It’s shaped to fit her needs, but worn to prove it’s lived a life. To her, this wear is what makes it “real” wood. I am in love with this sentiment from her.

That evening, I inspected the board I had worked to further its beautiful imperfectness after the second coat of varnish had dried. The only time I’d used a tape measure was to drill the holes for the brackets underneath, which need to be centered so the board could serve its purpose as a shelf.

When she returned home from work that night, the first thing she did was run one of her delicate, sturdy fingers along the front corner, where I’d shaped the board to incorporate a hole left by a dead knot. She didn’t have to say it, but I knew this was her favorite part of the shelf — I’d even predicted that in my head as I was working the material.

“It’s perfect,” she said. “I love it.”

And I love her.

Neither one of us is perfect those who look at us from outside of the love we have created, nurtured and instilled. Plenty have said she’s not right for me; I’m sure she’s had numerous tell her she could do better than a cankerous guy who doesn’t like meeting new people or trying new things that aren’t steak. I’ve been mean; she’s been mean. We both have dead knots that fall out at times we weren’t expecting.

Yet we’ve both learned to not only work with these natural holes, but to expect, appreciate, cherish and love them. She would not like a laser-cut, perfectly measured man the world says is right for her any more than I’d like a female counterpart to that.

Because to her, I have been laser-cut and perfectly measured as our time together goes on by the ticking and tocking of a clock powered by pitter-patters of little feet, tumultuousness we’ve overcome and quirks we’ve grown to embrace.

I am perfect to her … and she is perfect to me.